Fodor's may use your e-mail address to send you relevant information on site updates, account changes, and offers. For more information about your privacy and protection, please review our full Privacy Policy.

Road Trip - London - Scotland - Ireland - Wales - London

My wife were planning on a road trip starting in London. Trip is planned for June.

Day 1 - Arrive in Heathrow - pick up a rental car
Day 2 - London
Day 3 - London
Day 4 - London
Day 5 - depart London - drive to York
Day 6 - depart for Edinburgh
Day 7 - Edinburgh
Day 8 - drive to Cairnryan - take the car ferry to larne - drive to Belfast
Day 9 - drive to Dublin
Day 10 - Dublin
Day 11 - Drive to Killarney
Day 12 - Killarney
Day 13 - Drive to Rosslare - take the car ferry to Fishguard - drive to Newport
Day 14 - Newport
Day 15 - Back to London
Day 16 - Fly out

Any comments and suggestions are welcome Nothing is set in stone yet. We know we won't be able to see much, but wanted to get a feel for the UK and felt the best way was to drive rather than flying from one city to another.

Silly idea. Not being rude but practical. First (least of all) there is the issue of paying for a car on the ferries.

Your London > York > Edinburgh legs make no sense by car. They would IF you had time to explore, but you wouldn't. This part really only makes sense by train. And you dont want/need a car in any of the 3 cities. Then the Ireland bits are maybe even worse. You won't need a car in Dublin and you are giving yourselves about 1.5 days for 'rural/scenic' Ireland.

If it was me - I'd stick to EITHER England and Scotland - or - Ireland (or possibly London, fly to Ireland, fly home from Ireland)

Personally, I'm a fan of driving holidays and the principle of driving from London wouldn't faze me.

But:

- If you're flying from America it's stupid to the point of simple criminality to step off an overnight flight into a self drive car. Then driving it into London is prima facie grounds for having you deported.
- It's almost as stupid (but not criminal) to drive it, even after a night's proper sleep, into London, where you'll be paying up to £50 a day in parking and congestion charges for a lump of metal that's completely useless for most tourists as an option for getting round
- There's a serious argument there's no point in driving to York. Your plan allows no time for stopping off, the scenery's boring and the roads are crowded whichever route you take
- From York to Dublin, there's a kind of logic. But again: in York, Edinburgh and Dublin, you're lumbered with a lump of useless metal that's going to cost a fortune to park and take up serious tourism time getting rid of.
- from Killarney to Newport (why Newport? Have you any idea what a dump it is?) is a horrible drive, generally with a choice between sailings around 0900 (which mean leaving Killarney about 0400) or around 2100 (getting you into Newport around 0400.

You've allowed no time for anything between London and York. With a lot or reworking, it MIGHT make sense to collect a car in York, do your journey to Fishguard, them dump the car at Heathrow.

Kaustav, just checking do you mean Milton Keynes, which is way out of London. Flanners point about driving after a long flight is well made. Note that you are also on the wrong side of the road with different rules (for instance no "undertaking").

Driving from flat MK to flat York up a flat motorway (boring), I'd catch the train. York for one night is a bit meh (have you done much driving inside a medieval city?). Going north to Edinburgh by car is a bit more interesting and living near York I'd not do it compared to catching a train (and I already own my car).

Driving through Ireland (N&S) has its own charm and I enjoy it but the ferry seems a drab way to have a holiday. Catch a plane from Edinburgh or Glasgow.

Again Dublin is not really a place for cars.

Basically very few cities in the UK are designed for the car, except possibly for Milton Keynes (just so you know Milton Keynes [which I've lived and worked in] makes most Brits smile because of its crazy city layout which is just mad [all those right angles and straight roads])

As bilbo says, the drive from York to Edinburgh is great . . . But not if York and Edinburgh are your aims. You won't have any time for Hadrian's wall or Lindesfarne, or st Abbs Head, or anything. (You really won't have much time for York itself)

You'll have a little over half a day in York and 1+ day for Edinburgh. All of the places on your itinerary are fine . . . You simply don't have enough time to drive to them.

In rural bits plan on averaging 35-ish mph. Much faster on the motorways, but you don't see anything on the motorways.

Day 1 - take coach to Milton Keynes
Day 5 - train to York
Day 6 - train to Edinburgh
Day 8 - fly to Belfast
Day 9 - train/bus to Dublin
Day 11 - hire car to Killarney
Day 14 - drive to Cork, fly to London

You should also be aware that most hire companies will not allow you to take a car across to Northern Ireland and into the Republic and back again. If they do, there will be a big insurance charge and other surcharges.

Belfast seems to be just somewhere to sleep, so why not fly direct to Dublin, hire a car and do your Irish tour from there.

After reading all the responses I'm actually thinking about cancelling the car reservation. I really enjoy driving and have done some long drives in the past, but I kinda see it doesn't give us much time to see these locations.

So let's reboot - after London take a flight to Edinburgh - rent a car go up to the Isle of skye and then back to Edinburgh (4-5 days)

Dotheboyshall's plan is good and pretty efficient. Still very rushed, but ticks all your boxes. If Belfast was just there originally because of the ferry - then even better would be to fly from Scotland to Dublin and skip Belfast.

I reckon on 14 days to see the island of Ireland and get something out of it. Scotland slightly less, London you can keep Dublin's not much better and Belfast is good for a couple of days as a touring base.

That said you can coach and sail from Edinburgh to Belfast or Dublin.. Train from Dublin to Killarney. Forget Newport and fly Cork to London.

A road trip to those places is a great idea - IF you had another 8 or 9 days to actually see some things along the way. We have done several road trips in the UK and loved them - but first we spend several days in London, then picked up the car to drive around versus various routes - ending up in York or in Edinburgh and dropping the car there to fly home - or on to Paris.

But just from big city to big city with no days for smaller towns and countryside in between a car in a waste of money and a PIA.